Anyone who ever told you that swear words have no place in technical discussion is
right. They're right, and sadly, they're part of the problem because they
miss the point. The sterile word placement that's supposed to support an argument
makes any true motivation indistinguishable from all the hired bullshit.

Objective technical discussion is a God damned lie, and it's the most rotten kind of lie
because it's a way to stick your nose in the air, disguised as altruism.
Every time you post benchmarks, you're not moving any discussion forward.
When you compare web frameworks on one useless dimension or another, you don't
bring any value to the world. What you've done is relieve me of a task that's kind of a
pain in the ass, but by no means insurmountable. Ass scratching is not value.
You want to be heralded as a great visionary for your work,
and you think that getting on the front page of Hacker News or
Reddit means that people respect your opinion.

No. Your link is just space between the ads, and fuck-all if mine aren't too.

The skill it takes to write objectively about technology can be automated, and publishing
it yourself is disingenuous because it lacks passion.

However, when someone starts swearing in technical discussion, showing emotion,
that's a strong indicator that I'm about to receive wisdom. Wisdom is
earned the hard way, and it is permanent, not like some statistically shaky performance
benchmark that we'll all forget about next week.

Anyone who has ever told you that swear words are a cheap way to get an audience is
right, too. I've been on both the amateur and professional side of technical journalism,
and I'll tell you this: every way to get an audience is cheap. Let's take Paul Graham, for
example. Any emotion you detect in his essays is purely by accident, but he conveys a
message, and has a following. He would not have that following if he were some guy off
the street, so rattling off any damn thing and putting a Paul Graham byline on it is a
cheap way to get an audience.

But admit it, somewhere in the back of your gut is a rebellious nerve that wonders what
happens when Paul gets pissed off.

People like me, Zed Shaw, and Zach Holman will give you a brutally honest answer if
you ask for it. People like Paul won't. You will get a response, but it's in
newspaper words. The same newspaper words, that, by the way, with their self-imposed
emotional blockade, allow the nicest haircut to slither into the White House every couple
of years.

That's not to say that Paul is so proper in private. I don't know ﬁrst hand, but I have met
other leaders in technology who are more than willing to give you an earful over
cocktails. In public, however, they cultivate a persona.